August 27, 2010

Said Al Sharpton, narrowly defining rights. It's so close to the time when everyone was talking about the mosque near Ground Zero and even the staunch opponents assured us that there was a right to build the mosque, but that didn't mean it was a good thing to do.

I haven't been following this controversy, and I don't really know what Glenn Beck and his cohort are doing that could be construed as "distort[ing] what Dr. King's dream was about." But it's quite obvious that we all do have a right to distort King's ideas or any other ideas as much as we damned well please. And Sharpton and the rest of us also have a right to say that there is no such right, but it's not good to say that. Because it's not true. And it's anti-freedom. Ironically.

Thank you for saying so succinctly what I was just frothing at the mouth about for far too long to my (bored) college kid. Can't understand why she was more interested in her RPG than who defines rights....(ahem)

The whole purpose of Glenn Beck's rally is to demonstrate the power of the obstructionist mob and stick one in the eye of Obama & Co.

They don't have a de facto right to rally. Practically speaking, assembling in our nation's capitol is a privilege, not a right. The rally will go ahead only with the consent of the leaders of our regime.

Right now that consent is being granted. But it can be taken away at any moment. If Obama & Co decide to, they can easily order demonstrations like this prevented in the name of national security.

After all, Glenn Beck is anti-administration, and nowadays there's not much difference between being anti-administration and being a threat to national security.

The MLK thing is just a distraction. Who cares about MLK now, save for the obnoxious uppity black guy on a soapbox?

In the same vain that DJ commented: That "obnoxious uppity black guy on a soapbox" has subverted MLK's word. The character of a person no longer has meaning, it's his political stripe that is what determines a person's value these days.

Ann, the big manufactured issue is that the Beck rally takes place on the 47th anniversary of the "I have a dream" speech at the same place.

We all obsessively observe 47th anniversaries, after all.

If anyone has tarnished Dr King's dream ("judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin"), I put Rev Al right beside Jesse Jackson. I'd love to see somebody on Fox mention Crown Heights, Freddy's Fashion Mart, and Yankel Rosenbloom to the Sharpster the next time he bloviates about this.

Dead Julius said...

The whole purpose of Glenn Beck's rally is to demonstrate the power of the obstructionist mob and stick one in the eye of Obama & Co.

The whole purpose is exercise of the First Amendment (Freedom of Speech, Freedom to Peaceably Assemble and Petition the Government for Redress of Grievance). You know, unimportant stuff that you're not allowed to do if you're not a Lefty.

peter hoh: No one has the right to not be offended.Someone please tell that to the ACLU and the progressive judges who keep telling the conservatives to stop talking about religion because it offends the anti-religious.

Now cue the offended black people muttering about MLK with Al Sharpton at the helm... assuming, that is, that they make it all the way to the counter-protest and aren't distracted by the many opportunities to smoke crack and lazily drink forties that D.C. offers.

Is any of this real?

I'll be watching online and I really really really hope to see a violent brawl break out. Then it'll be worth it.

Gee, I hope you're being ironic. Unless you really believe America is a country where a white male can't catch a break.

No one has the right to not be offended.

Funny thing about free speech. When it comes to speech that infuriates the right, the left talks a good game by quoting Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. ("not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate"), but when it comes to speech that infuriates the left, suddenly "speech has consequences" and words hurt.

If Sharpton REALLY believed in Dr. King's dream, he'd give up race huckstering in favor of seeking a color-blind America. Ditto the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. They're not in favor of equal treatment for all Americans, either. Now that they're no longer oppressed and the worm has turned (see the Obama "Justice" Department's response to the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case in Philadelphia in the 2008 election), the NAACP is just fine with those "crackers" getting discriminated against.

The old civil rights crowd are now in favor of civil wrongs, as long as they get to be on the giving end of it.

King was a Communist who should have been shot as a traitor for undermining the country during the Vietnam war. It is great that Mr. Beck is trying to restore the honor that was lost during the 1960s by the likes of this grand-daddy of all race hustlers. The coming Republican majority needs to get rid of the King holiday.

"Practically speaking, assembling in our nation's capitol is a privilege, not a right. The rally will go ahead only with the consent of the leaders of our regime. Right now that consent is being granted. But it can be taken away at any moment."

It only seems that way.

In reality, Obama's power is what can be taken away in a single moment. The moment he start's believing what you wrote is the moment he will no longer be our President.

Professor -- admitting you haven't been following the affair and don't know what Beck could be doing to be distorting King's message, you might start with Back's on-air claim that he “wouldn’t be surprised if in our lifetime dogs and fire hoses are released or opened on us. I wouldn’t be surprised if a few of us get a billy club to the head. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of us go to jail — just like Martin Luther King did — on trumped-up charges. Tough times are coming.”

I'm no fan of Sharpton's, but it demonstrates an obscene ignorance of American history to suggest he's the leader of a movement as oppressed as were African-Americans at the time of the Civil Rights Movement.

Scott said..."They don't have a de facto right to rally. Practically speaking, assembling in our nation's capitol is a privilege, not a right."And anyone who knows anything knows it's false."

Hi Scott. Actually it is completely correct. One must obtain permission and get a permit. Permits, particularly those involving federal monument land and buildings are extended. It is, of course, your right to apply for a permit. It is a privilege to be granted one....lol speaking of Trolls...

I think Beck is a canny huckster, but there's no better argument for his rally than the fact that King's legacy is being defined by another, considerably more odious huckster. I'd stick anybody up there to pry Sharpton's reptilian claws off King's words and life.

Beck is half a wack job. The other half is good common sense and insightful commentary. Anyone who gets F. Hayak back on the best seller list can't be all bad.

I'd like to see what he and others at the rally talk about before I condemn it or praise it. One thing it won't be (not from Beck) is any kind of "hate rally." He's not likely to be insulting MLK either.

Friedman: "I'm no fan of Sharpton's, but it demonstrates an obscene ignorance of American history to suggest he's the leader of a movement as oppressed as were African-Americans at the time of the Civil Rights Movement. 8/28/10 6:47 AM"

I'm not going to go so far as to say "obscene." But bizarrely uncomprehending of what it means to be black in America.

There is a chasm of misunderstanding and incomprehension on how offensive it is to compare getting pushback in the political arena (Beck et al.) to being de jure and de facto invisible citizens (the African-American experience for 400 years).

I know Beck is exercising his right of free speech & assembly, and more power to that.

It's just incredible bad taste, shows incredible ignorance, is incredibly hurtful to a large class of people, and is needlessly provocative on the wrong issues.

At some point conservatives will see blacks as people and will understand how ignorant and unhearing they've been.

There is a chasm of misunderstanding and incomprehension on how offensive it is to compare getting pushback in the political arena (Beck et al.) to being de jure and de facto invisible citizens (the African-American experience for 400 years).

No Miller, only 300 years, and now NO BLACK can claim they invisible citizens, can they? Put down the victim Kool-Aid or its associated White Guilt Gatorade.

Is distorting white people racist? And if not, is distortion of black people committed by a black person not racist because one must be a of contrasting color to act, speak or write in a racist manner?

Does racist distortion only occur when in the presence of a special catalyst (ie Glenn Beck), or does it occur only when observed by a special observer (ie Sharpton)?

Lemma: X indicts Y. Such indictment is racist if and only if X and Y have non-identical color. Except when X is Sharpton and Y is any non-Sharpton, unless the negritude of the non-Sharpton is greater than zero.

Premise: X praises Y. Such praise is non-racist if and only if the negritude of X equals or exceeds the negritude of Sharpton (Sn,the Sharpton negritude criticalicality threshold factor)

Damn. What this country needs is a theory of political chromodynamics which doesn't cause brain injury.

There is a chasm of misunderstanding and incomprehension on how offensive it is to compare getting pushback in the political arena (Beck et al.) to being de jure and de facto invisible citizens (the African-American experience for 400 years).

, you might start with Back's on-air claim that he “wouldn’t be surprised if in our lifetime dogs and fire hoses are released or opened on us. I wouldn’t be surprised if a few of us get a billy club to the head. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of us go to jail — just like Martin Luther King did — on trumped-up charges. Tough times are coming.”

Peter's concern, that Miller and Ritmo apparently echo, is that Beck "suggest[s] he's the leader of a movement as oppressed as were African-Americans at the time of the Civil Rights Movement."

Now, ya'll do understand the difference between the present tense and a prediction of what could possibly happen in the future, right? Beck, in the very statement you quoted, didn't say that he is anything, or that any movement is like the civil rights movement, only that it could be in the future.

You may diagree with him and claim that his prediction (which he said is only a possibilty, not a sure thing) is impossible, and I'll hear you out on that, but don't lie about the very quote that you are using to gin up your false outrage.

Sharpton wants us to quit congregating in front of his carnival booth on the Midway. The customers at Beck's booth are spilling over into his spot, and even copying his revivalist methods, the cheats.

Sharpton wants to remind the rubes that, as Palladian has said, we're merely fungible sources of government revenue. So shut up and get back to work so you can pay what you owe to Uncle Sam, or hewill call you racist and homophobe and islamophobe and haters of the poor.

Alan Simpson had the metaphor all wrong. It's one enormous government pig -fully grown and grotesquely huge- suckling from a sickly and thin American public, and the pig is bitching at us to flow faster you goddamned ungrateful swine.

Sharpton is merely trying to enforce Newspeak, and accusing Beck and attendees of thoughtcrime.

"By 2050—earlier, probably—all real knowledge of Oldspeak will have disappeared. The whole literature of the past will have been destroyed. Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron—they'll exist only in Newspeak versions, not merely changed into something different, but actually contradictory of what they used to be. Even the literature of the Party will change. Even the slogans will change. How could you have a slogan like "freedom is slavery" when the concept of freedom has been abolished? The whole climate of thought will be different. In fact there will be no thought, as we understand it now. Orthodoxy means not thinking—not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness."

Oh that's one clever trick Beck's got up his sleeve, Lyssa! Predicting the possibility of something rather than its inevitability.

It almost makes me find him credible. Almost. Not quite but just about.

That disclaimer, big enough to drive a Mack truck through, that the scenarios he, er, entertains are not set in stone... Well, I would have read the fine print if my field of vision weren't so obscured by the Nuhrenburg footage so prominently displays across the near entirety of my (computer) screen.

Beck is to subtlety and plausible speculation what Chicken Little was to the apocalypse.

And good on the false outrage, stuff - given how much real outrage he's out to gin up on the part of the righties and unaffiliated nutcases who actually bother to give him any credence whatsoever.

r-v . . .explain why Beck disingenuously claimed he had no idea that Aug 28 was the date of the MLK speech

Tell me honestly, before this controversy arose, did you hear 8/28, and immediently identify it as the date of that speech? If someone had asked you when it was, would you have even been able to tell them with certaintly which month the speech occurred in?

I sure couldn't have. The speech meant something; the date, not so much, except to drum up false outrage.

I guess comment like Who cares about MLK now, save for the obnoxious uppity black guy on a soapbox?, explain why Beck disingenuously claimed he had no idea that Aug 28 was the date of the MLK speech.==========

How does one person's outrageous comment on a blog explain Beck's thinking? Dead Julius was not speaking for Beck.

The left, the very originators of fascism, love to use the threat of fascism on the right to enforce American state fascism.

But now that we have Gummint Motors and that the gummint now controls 1/6th of the economy (healthcare) and so minutely regulates what we drive and where we can walk and (according to Sharpton) when we can rally and where, their Nazi scare words ring increasingly hollow.

I guess comments like "Who cares about MLK now, save for the obnoxious uppity black guy on a soapbox?, explain why Beck disingenuously claimed he had no idea that Aug 28 was the date of the MLK speech. And I guess by extension of this belief it is those uppity blacks in the White house that we need to take back our freedom from. Look Beck has every right to promote his I Have A Scheme and sell some more over-priced gold while wrapping it in faux patriotism, but the question I have a right to ask is-- is it wise?

As I said, all that Nuremnberg footage Beck flashes across the screen, the hysterical voice, the faked tears - it all makes me think what a subtle and plausible speculator he is.

Maybe I should ask him when he "might have" stopped beating his wife.

The country sees right through his insane bullshit. I understand that cons love nothing as much as the old media that the rest of the country has moved on from (first radio, now the boob tube), but this is the internet age now, dear. The propagandistic tricks of the teevee are pretty clear, well known, and apparently proudly appropriated by a right-wing sympathetic loon to whom ignorant manipulation distortion come as naturally as do eating, drinking and sleeping.

The fine print doesn't matter when the actual purpose of his "broadcasts" are quite clear. Feel happily absolved about his legalistic finagling all you want. Enough people know what he's about.

I think the blog sentiments sum up the lack of attention many whites pay to MLK as reflected in Becks' denial of knowledge about the date, which is ironic given that speech is still taught in most high schools.

roesch-voltaire wrote: I guess comment like Who cares about MLK now, save for the obnoxious uppity black guy on a soapbox?, explain why Beck disingenuously claimed he had no idea that Aug 28 was the date of the MLK speech.

I have only ever seen b&w footage of that speech (and only tiny snippets, at that). But I've seen that footage time and again, about as often as I've seen Apollo 11 material. Enough to know that it's IMPORTANT, ie important to the powers and authorities who want me to see it as important (which doesn't mean that it is necessarily unimportant) However, until today I have been unaware of the date of the "I Have a Dream Speech". I knew it was in the early to middle 60s, but I assumed it was in the early autumn or spring because the weather seemed overcast and MKL was wearing a suit, as in not hot weather.

Okay, roesch-voltaire, without looking it up give us the date of the Gettysburg Address...

I think the blog sentiments sum up the lack of attention many whites pay to MLK as reflected

You are conflating the importance of the man and his message with the importance of the date.The date isn't someone we, as a nation, commemorate often. It certainly isn't something we've been holding sacrosanct.

I really really hope that the left and the blacks that have been egged on by the race hucksters do NOT cause any violence.

People are at a tipping point right now and there are crazies on the right that I'm very much afraid will retaliate. If so, it will not be pretty and it will not go away.

It is almost as if the people attending the Beck rally are going as lambs to slaughter, just as did blacks in the peaceful civil rights rallies of Martin Luther King.

The tables have turned; and now the violence and discrimination is from the left and from blacks who hold 'beat whitey' nights with no consequences to themselves.

I pray (literally) that nothing bad will happen tomorrow.

If anything does, I blame Obama for purposely stirring up racial divisions and the race hucksters like Sharpton and more.....I blame America for allowing people to be a protected "victim" class long after there is any need for any such protection.

The controversy isn't really about MLKjr at all, but about Barack Obama. Nothing is supposed to get in the way of our memories of him on the steps of the Lincoln memorial just days before his inauguration, when we loved him so. He was MLKjr's dream and the reincarnation of Lincoln, all in one unifying figure.

At least Beck doesn't have access to the Lincoln china to serve brunch on later.

In which Ritmo, embarrassed by the true past of the global left, tries desperately to ignore the actual origins of fascism-communism-socialism, and especially to cleave off the one they are most embarrassed by.

Strangely, Ritmo picks the single form of collectivist statism that killed the fewest of its own citizens.

Listening to the John Bircher, Pogo, who appropriates an icon of Walt Kelly, nonetheless, spew his propaganda is like listening to other revolutionary physicians, such as Che Guevara and Ayman al Zawahiri, who nothing of a sane understanding of politics.

Fascism was originated by Benito Mussolini, who was a man of the Left and a life-long socialist. Today's Left will deny it and the minions of MiniTrue have been busily expunging the records since 1941 at least.

However, rail on as you may, Italian Fascism was the child of socialism. It adopted the command model without ownership of the means of production, which essentially created a socialist state with a much reduced bureaucracy and a greater concentration of power at the top. It also allowed Mussolini to reject one fundamental demand of the Italian socialists and thereby put at ease the titled aristocracy, specifically the overthrow of the House of Savoy.

Germany's NSDAP adopted the Fascist economic model, a move which benefited many parties: Hitler by freeing him of the onerous task of cooking up an economic policy of his own, the German industrialists by leaving them nominally in control of their own property and having their positions guaranteed by state authority (sound familiar?), the socialist for giving them a terminology which would allow them to conveniently ignore the socialist part of National Socialism and a stick with which to flog anyone of their choosing for any reason, and the Left in general by providing a bête noire trot out whenever they have no logically sound arguments to make, which is most of the time.

Hey, a Walt Kelly fan.That makes you and me that get the reference.But well played, sir.

It's pointless arguing about the interpretation of history by claiming that one person is 'ignorant' of it merely because they disagree with your conclusion. I can cite a dozen references explaining the collectivist origins of fascism, but you'll not read them or be convinced by them, so why bother?

I don't have a problem with Beck re-interpreting (to put it charitably) King. He should just be honest about the meaning of the original history and distinguish that from how he'd like to re-interpret it and why.

It would make him less credible, but more honest and respectable, ironically enough.

I can cite a dozen references explaining the collectivist origins of fascism, but you'll not read them or be convinced by them, so why bother?

Exactly so. If you're just as unwilling to accept the far-right influences and general designation of fascism as it is understood, why go on about what it took from or has in common with the left? It makes me wonder for whose benefit you'd be making the argument.

Ritmo, your assertion is that you can't refer to historic figures, and their ideals unless your event is supposed to be a direct interpretation of an event led by one of those figures? That's bizarre.

That's also not what I'm saying.

I'm saying that if you're going to invoke historic figures to the point of appropriating them, you need to be honest about what their historic significance is. You have to stop smudging the distinctions between why they were significant and how you want to use them.

Your comments read as though you don't know what Beck's event is. Are you watching it? It's not, and was never intended to be, a commemoration of the "I Have a Dream" speech.

I know that. Come on.

It appears to be a religious revival. That's also what Beck had indicated it would be.

There are many common threads in history. MLK was a preacher and used religious rhetoric far more effectively than a whole host of 20th century figures. We'll see if Beck has those chops or if he simply envies them enough to want to emulate how they were employed.

Scholars generally consider fascism to be on the far right of the conventional left-right political spectrum.

Lyons, Matthew N.. "What is Fascism? Some General Ideological Features". PublicEye.org. Political Research Associates. Retrieved 2009-10-27.^ a b Griffin, Roger: "The Palingenetic Core of Fascism", Che cos'è il fascismo? Interpretazioni e prospettive di ricerche, Ideazione editrice, Rome, 2003 AH.Brookes.ac.uk^ a b Stackleberg, Rodney Hitler's Germany, Routeledge, 1999, p. 3^ a b Eatwell, Roger: "A 'Spectral-Syncretic Approach to Fascism', The Fascism Reader, Routledge, 2003 pp 71–80 Books.google.com^ a b Lipset, Seymour: "Fascism as Extremism of the Middle Class", The Fascism Reader, Routledge, 2003, pp. 112–116^ Benito Mussolini's Doctrine of Fascism regards fascism as right-wing and collectivist, but it also declares that fascism is sympathetic to ameliorating the conditions that brought about the rise of left-wing political movements, such as class conflict socialism and liberal democracy, while simultaneously opposing the egalitarianism associated with the left. "We are free to believe that this is the century of authority, a century tending to the 'right', a Fascist century." ... "We are free to believe that this is the 'collective' century, and thus the century of the state. It is eminently reasonable for a new doctrine to make use of still-vital elements from other doctrines," ... "Fascism is totalitarian, and the Fascist State—a synthesis and a unit inclusive of all values—interprets, develops, and potentiates the whole life of a people." (p. 14) "The Fascist negation of socialism, democracy, liberalism, should not, however, be interpreted as implying a desire to drive the world backwards to positions occupied prior to 1789, a year commonly referred to as that which opened the demo-liberal century. History does not travel backwards. The Fascist doctrine has not taken De Maistre as its prophet. Monarchical absolutism is of the past, and so is ecclesiolatry. Dead and done for are feudal privileges and the division of society into closed, uncommunicating castes. Neither has the Fascist conception of authority anything in common with that of a police ridden State." ... "Fascism is therefore opposed to Socialism to which unity within the State (which amalgamates classes into a single economic and ethical reality) is unknown, and which sees in history nothing but the class struggle. Fascism is likewise opposed to trade unionism as a class weapon. But when brought within the orbit of the State, Fascism recognises the real needs which gave rise to socialism and trade-unionism, giving them due weight in the guild or corporative system in which divergent interests are coordinated and harmonised in the unity of the State." (p.15) "In rejecting democracy Fascism rejects the absurd conventional lie of political equalitarianism, the habit of collective irresponsibility, the myth of felicity and indefinite progress." ... "Fascism denies that numbers, as such, can be the determining factor in human society; it denies the right of numbers to govern by means of periodical consultations; it asserts the irremediable and fertile and beneficent inequality of men who cannot be leveled by any such mechanical and extrinsic device as universal suffrage." Doctrine of Fascism.

kimsch said...They won't do that Trooper. Next weekend is the Labor Day Weekend. Can't have two holidays thisclose unless they are Christmas and New Year's.

That's just not right. I think they should celebrate all the other silly holiday's on one day. You know Washington and Lincoln and Columbus and St Patrick and Thanksgiving and Arbor Day and Groundhog day should all be on the same day.

That way we can have a holiday dedicated to Martin Lurhter King every month of the year.

Alpha, they just started going on and on about King because they're introducing Alveda King. Of course they're highlighting where they agree with King. Would you rather, on the anniversary of the speech and at its location, they parsed all of his words, going through where they agreed with him and where they disagreed? I think such an event is unlikely.

Well, if conservativism were pro-government, that statement might make a tiny bit of sense, but conservatives are not pro-government, much less pro-activist government. So saying such things really does nothing more than prove you to be a know-nothing idiot.

To get back to the original point of the post, the only thing I wish to say about King and Beck's speech is that this is a reaction to the former in the same way that people went on and on about the significance of Obama's election.

The problem is, I daresay the significance of that moment has past. Not many people care any more about the election of a historically oppressed minority to the highest office in the land in America, nor do they need to at this point. Now that's all just for the historians to decide the significance of it. The many issues Obama or any American president at this point have to be concerned with are the real issue, and rightly so.

That said, I think Beck's invocation of King and fixation with Obama's person as a political leader do reflect the unease that the far-right had with Obama's popularity originally. I think this event he's holding today reflects his need to react to that, the idea of Obama as a political movement, because he intends to meet it with a political movement of his own.

The only problem is, at this point we should really be focusing on policies, rather than political movements - whether on the left, right or whether they were somehow original and authentic or just reactions to them.

Joe - "It is impossible to know what Dr, King would think of today....for all his trollness Tidy has one point correct.

By the end Dr. King had been influenced by Communists, and his own reflection, into supporting "Social Justice."Dr. King might, today, be just as big a Progressive Democrat as Al Sharpton...don't fool yourself."

---------------------MLK, blessed be his name, may be one of those figures vastly overrated by Martyrdom. It took 40 years for the books to finally start being straightened out on JFK and Camelot....and a line of idiot Presidents culminating in the present one to make people reflect back - "At least Eisenhower, LBJ, Nixon, Reagan, Bush Sr., and Clinton knew what they were doing, most the time"!

King was not "the leader" of the Civil Rights movement. He was one of the leaders. He had is moments, but so did others involved.What most people avoided following his assassination is doing biography instead of hagiography. His involvement with communists was minimized. His domestic violence minimized. His philandering and whore-beating minimized. His plagarism only discussed in a way that casts it as a "yes, but..." As in "Yes Dr King may have been overly inspired by other peoples work and not been as careful with attribution as he should have been for his PhD and the MLK Family copywrited speeches and writings they have made millions off of...but it shouldn't detract from his Greatness". Complaints of other civil rights leaders that King diverted money from SLCC funds for whores and carousing and favoring "his people" over Abernathy's - glossed over..

I think there is more good than bad in the guy, and he is a positive figure in history, but there is something profoundly wrong in the present situation.What other figure has two filing cabinets full of FBI surveillance documents under Fed Court ordered lock and key? What figure that is the only American awarded a national holiday in his name, who school children and ignorant conservatives are trained to parrot his remarks?Which other American with MLK's mixed "blessings" is given a national monument (not to mention the biggest and most lavish one?) and all the Federally funded "side-monuments"?

Martin Luther King is the most important American in the histoy of the United States. No one compares to him. Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln are a mere bag of shells. It is totally racist of you to talk like that!

By the way, next Thursday is the anniversay of the first time he went potty by himself. I think that calls for a day of national remembrance at the very least.

The very wealthy Home Depot founder castigated and executives who are not contributing to the Republicans Party and related corporate campaign funds:

"If a retailer has not gotten involved with this, if he has not spent money on this election, if he has not sent money to Norm Coleman and these other guys," Mr. Marcus said, apparently referring to Republican senators facing tough re-election fights, then those retailers "should be shot; should be thrown out of their goddamn jobs."

I'd just like to point out that *big* corporations absolutely love these sorts of regulations. They have far more resources to handle them than their smaller competitors; therefore, they gain more market power with very little (comparative) loss.

Alternatively, did AL just brag on the ability of the Democratic agenda to hurt businesses (which could otherwise be producing jobs)? Jeeze.

I'm not quite sure I understand this event, except to say that now Lyssa's comments make more sense. Beck is rallying his minions to be redeemed and provoke thoughtful change in themselves, lest the country goes to hell in a handbasket.

I guess that's the significance of the faint disclaimers we debated earlier. We're going to hell and the country will run off a cliff unless Beckians become more thoughtful and decent people.

Sorry Quaestor I was out at the farmers market and shopping at Sears so I could not respond in the manner you asked for, but it seems Ritmo is doing a nice job of pointing out how propagandist like Beck enjoy distorting history.

"The Home Depot founder spoke in support of a pro-Republican business campaign fund."

I've looked over the article a couple of times, but I'm not seeing any reference to what you describe here. I see something about a conference call and how Mr. Marcus had taken things upon himself and that he was very pro-Republican, but nothing that refers to what you described.

Did I miss a link, or could you point it out to me? I await your far more vast powers of reading comprehension.

Wow. From Ben Jealous of the NAACP at the counter-rally:"Dr King never had to ask his followers to leave hateful signs and guns at home.”

Actually, if we care about being historically correct --

"In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence."--Martin Luther KingAugust 28, 1963, Wash. D.C."I Have A Dream" Speech

You can always tell the historically ignorant when they start ranting about "corporatism" and "corporations" in discussions of fascism as if the term refers to the likes of modern-day companies such as Exxon, Microsoft, WalMart, Ford, etc.

Beck's choice of day and place for the rally "is insulting, is what it is," said Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League.

Jaime Contreras, president of SEIU-32BJ, said those gathered at the Mall with Beck "represent angry white people and hate-mongering." He added: "We will not let them stand in the way of the change we voted for!"

"They have a right to rally. But what they don't have the right do is distort what Dr. King's dream was about," the Rev. Al Sharpton declared Friday. He called the tea party assembly an anti-government action and has organized a counter rally also near the site of King's historic speech.

Kinda makes me wonder what they would think of a Mosque being built near ground zero.

"Fascism is therefore opposed to Socialism to which unity within the State (which amalgamates classes into a single economic and ethical reality) is unknown, and which sees in history nothing but the class struggle. Fascism is likewise opposed to trade unionism as a class weapon."

"In rejecting democracy Fascism rejects the absurd conventional lie of political equalitarianism, the habit of collective irresponsibility, the myth of felicity and indefinite progress."

-- Benito Mussolini, Doctrine of Fascism.

Sounds like something Pogo would write. No wonder the squirmy little squish is getting (always) defensive.

"Fascism [is] the precise negation of that doctrine which formed the basis of the so-called Scientific or Marxian Socialism. (p. 30)

After Socialism, Fascism attacks the whole complex of democratic ideologies and rejects them both in their theoretical premises and in their applications or practical manifestations. Fascism denies that the majority, through the mere fact of being a majority, can rule human societies; it denies that this majority can govern by means of a periodical consultation; it affirms the irremediable, fruitful and beneficent inequality of men, who cannot be levelled by such a mechanical and extrinsic fact as universal suffrage. (p. 31)

Fascism is definitely and absolutely opposed to the doctrines of liberalism, both in the political and economic sphere."